I don't listen to music in the car all too often, but when I do, I'd like to have moderate quality and enough volume to overcome road noise. The base system does neither for me.

Found this Panasonic CQ-C8803U on Crutchfield and it got me thinking with 31 watts RMS I might be able to skate by having to purchase an amp.

I was curious if any of you gurus know of a head unit with even more power and/or an efficient set of component speakers that would be happy with that.

Secondary wish list items:
1. iPod compatible
2. hands free bluetooth phone support

I seem to recall Alpine offering something along these lines with 45 watts RMS, but can't find it now.

 

Only one way to find out, replace the head unit and then see where your at. AN aftermarket head unit will be ok for awhile but I wouldnt plan on the stock speakers sounding good for a few months at best before they start to distort and sound like poo.
just my $.02

 

Depends on what speakers you will be using. If you're staying stock, there is no need to get an amp. Should you get some x-over speakers, you'll want an amp to push the maximum power to the speakers. My Boston's push 175 watts RMS.

 

I have three amplifiers (12 channels total) in my home theater with somewhere around 2KW, my listening room is over 40,000 cubic feet (the Z is about 100) and rarely do I need more than 10 watts.

A good head end will produce a nice +100 dB volume. I pulled my Z's stock Bose out so fast I never had a chance to measure it but haven't pulled the Rockford Fostgate system out of my Xterra yet. I don't know what the amplifier is rated/claimed but I would h***ard a SWAG about 25 watts per channel and possibly twice that (ha!) on the subwoofer and it breaks +110 dB as measured. That's loud. That's shouting at the top of your lungs loud trying to talk to the passenger.

I think that's the reason I see so many young people at clubs where the volume is so loud you can't hear the nonsense that their date is screaming at them ... and then see them driving home with the volume in the car even louder ... it wouldn't be that they're deaf could it?

I used the 22 watt per channel head-end amplifier to drive my front and rear speakers while waiting for my amplifiers to arrive. It was plenty loud and very clear for your described uses in my humble opinion. What you could do is buy a head end that has both line level and speaker level outputs. Run the speakers off the speaker level output and run the RCA's out of the dash and down into the center console. Later if you ever desire more noise ... just run the RCA cables backk and run new speaker wires out from the new amplifiers.

 

We can't say h***ard here?

Dudes of h***ard!

H***ard a guess?

My h***ard lights are stuck.

 

J*** is good music

r***le d***le

Yep it works

 

Yeah the stock speakers probably won't last long. What should I look for in the sensitivity rating of potential speakers to make sure whatever I'm buying is efficient? Higher Db or Lower Db?

 

Your system will always sound better with a decent amp versus no amp, No matter what your speakers are, However better the speakers better the sound. You may want to consider the door pods to bring your sound stage up and closer to you.